The use of "spot colour" in photography !!!

[super snatcher]

I have never been a fan of "spot colour" in photography and had therefore never tried it before. I just happened to be sorting some photo files out yesterday on my passport hard drive when for some reason I thought of that technique when looking at a picture of Beverly Minster I had taken. Its certainly not a difficult technique to apply but I still cannot decide if I like it or not.

What do you think ? It certainly has its uses to the professionals as they can highlight products using it. I am still sitting on the fence on this one

John

 

[Peter Jacobs]

I think that given the right subject matter, like your example, then it can be a very powerful application, providing it is not over-used.

That said, I'm no David Bailey either . . . . . . . . .

 

[chav professor]

What program do you use to apply 'spot colour'? I am after a software package that enables a bit of editing, touching up etc and would appreciate your advice.

 

[barbelboi]

Photoshop contains spot colour Chav. For freeware photoscape is an exceptionally good package and contains many editing features (some similar to SC).
Jerry

 

[laguna]

PS, AI and CD are three that come to mind,

Spot colours print clean and sharp and only create half-tones when tinted, shaded, faded or used as a gradient blend. Other than that, all spot colors regardless of their actual color on screen will output as solid black to your film when at 100% Tint. here

 

[super snatcher]

I used Photoshop CS5 on this picture. Using the pen tool I made a selection of the window,then selected inverse and converted the rest of the image to black and white. Bear in mind I am self taught in Photshop and there may be better/easier techniques to use than the method I used. Having said that it only took me a couple of minutes from start to finish.

John

 

[Jeff Woodhouse]

Your example was a nice shape to do teh way you did it, and it looks good.

For more informal shapes, people etc., it's normal practice to use layers putting B/W layer on top of the colour and then using an eraser, wipe the area from the B/W to reveal the colour underneath. If you slip up and wipe too much you can always undo the last little bit and try again.

I think there are other ways too. I'd have to look back through a library of PS tutorials though.

 

[Jeff Woodhouse]

Found one and it involves, as I said, creating a layer (or more layers if you want to adjust contrast and other stuff) and removing the saturation (makes it black and white). Then with each layer you get a layer mask and on this you paint black where the colour should pop through. If you make a mistake and overpaint with the black you can take it back by painting white, swap between black and white until everything you want is in colour.

Now I bet that all makes sense, doesn't it?

Next week I shall be explaining the off-side rule... :wh

 

[Neil Maidment]

Also called colour popping and such variations. Most applications and free image hosting sites (Photobucket.com for example) have the tools to do it. As has been said, for the right subject, it can be a powerful tool.

I like this one but that's just because of the subject matter: